July 21, 2005

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Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona, this is The Dividing Line.
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The Apostle Peter commanded Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us, yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence.
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Our host is Dr. James White, director of Alpha Omega Ministries and an elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church.
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This is a live program and we invite your participation. If you'd like to talk with Dr. White, call now at 602 -973 -4602 or toll free across the
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United States. It's 1 -877 -753 -3341. And now with today's topic, here is
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James White. Well I figured out the value of the human soul today.
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I was directed to a link for the Bailey Smith Ministries Soul a
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Month Club. Soul a Month Club, and in describing the Soul a
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Month Club, Mr. Smith here says,
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I was at Peace Baptist Church in Wilson, North Carolina, and made the statement that for every $48 given to Bailey Smith Ministries, someone will get saved.
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A couple after service said to me, why don't you start a Soul a Month Club? We would like to send you $48 a month.
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Ministry born. And then there's a little discussion of this picture. Years ago
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I read of a ship that had gone down the Atlantic and a part of the cargo was a large cross to be delivered to a new church. It was floating in the water and a crew member of the sunken ship climbed on the cross to save his life and he was reaching out to get others to the cross.
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Wow. I asked a graphic artist to draw me a picture of that and here it is. Don't you love it? It grabs my heart every time I look at it.
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Well, that's okay. See yourself saved by the cross and with $48 a month you are bringing someone drowning in sin to safety.
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What a privilege and responsibility. And so, oh, and then at the end there's a
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P .S. By the way, in some churches it costs $100 ,000 to $300 ,000 to see one convert.
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Please make your check to Bailey Smith Ministry. Some are giving $96 a month representing a soul for the husband and the wife.
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There you go, folks. $48 is the cost of the human soul, $48.
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$46, I think we need to figure out what our cost is. Have we figured out our cost yet?
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We need to try this. Someone was in channel saying they'd do it for $20 and that they were the
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Walmart of evangelism. I don't know. That's some pretty serious bang for your buck. That's a lot.
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That's pretty hard to compete with. That's very hard. The $100 ,000 to $300 ,000, that's huge, but I'm not really sure what he means there.
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Anyway. There is the inevitable result of Arminianism.
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There it is. Now, of course, he wouldn't say he's an Arminian because there's a group trying to arrange a debate.
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Back sometime next year in the Midwest, they've been having really good turnouts for debates they've been having, and their students want to do a debate on Calvinism.
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I'm happy to do it, but we can't find Arminian who will do it. We've been turned down by Geisler.
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Hunt turned us down again. Of course, we'll be talking a little bit more about that. He's not going to expose himself to that kind of situation.
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One of the people that we've had some contact with is Dr. Ergen Kainer.
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I think he's at Liberty now. He may be at a Southern Baptist school someplace. I'm not certain exactly where he is right now.
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He's a Muslim convert. We had had some contact with him about possibly doing a debate.
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At first, he had said, that's great, that's fine, but then he seemed to be cooling off of the idea.
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I gave his name and email address to this group and said, you can try. We're trying everybody.
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He sent back an email declining the debate yesterday. One of the things he said was, I'm not an
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Arminian, I'm a Baptist. I'm not an Arminian, I'm a Baptist. I started to chuckle a little bit when
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I saw that. I'm like, how do you respond to that particular thing?
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I said to him, in essence, I said, that's a little bit like saying,
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I'm not an American, I live in Phoenix. I know all sorts of Arminian Baptists.
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They are not mutually exclusive categories. But more so, he said to the man who had contacted him,
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I hold to neither the cultic views of reprobation nor limited atonement.
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The only way I can read that is that he's identifying the idea of reprobation or limited atonement as cultic.
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I did write to him, finally, because I hadn't actually written to him. Other people were writing to him. I finally wrote to him and said, you're sure you want to say that?
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Anyway, he's associated with this Bailey Smith thing, too. You can see a picture of him on the website here. It's BaileySmith .org,
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Solomonth .asp, if you want to take a look, $48. Of course, I sit here going, what audacity?
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What audacity to tell people they'll send you $48, you'll save a soul.
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I mean, talk about man -centered theology. Wow. I just...
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Anyway, if you've been following the blog, you know that Dave Hunt has done it again.
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I got a note yesterday saying that he had a new book out, and so I looked at his website and they finally linked it, and so you can look at it in PDF and the actual printed version.
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It's only like 104 pages, very small, but we have a user -friendly book on Calvinism now.
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And of course, immediately, I just stop and go, wait a minute, wait a minute. This man is having to put out a new edition of What Love Is This to take out the
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Hebrew original of Acts 13 garbage, and he's had to change his approach on these things numerous times.
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As I put on the blog, he's done the theological equivalent of a face plant every time he tries to address this subject.
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When is enough enough? And if he thinks, when people contact him, and again, the same group contacted him, and he said,
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Dave thinks what he said in the open letter, Dave thinks what he said in debating
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Calvinism, that's enough. Don't need to do anything more. Well then why are you doing more? Why are you putting out
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CD sets and cassette tapes and all the rest of this stuff about Calvinism?
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It's funny. Would he decline challenging Carl Keating if Carl Keating contacted him?
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There's now a Calvinism section, right along with Roman Catholicism on the Bringing Call website.
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So, you know, it seems that a lot of these folks just are becoming exceptionally strong in their denunciation of Reformed theology as being cultic and false and misleading and misrepresentational of God and all the rest of this stuff.
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But isn't it interesting, only one side is willing to debate the issue.
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The other side just wants monologues. And we've heard that. We've played some stuff from the pastor there in St.
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Louis. I would never let a Calvinist in my pulpit to explain his position. It's like I wouldn't have a Mormon or a Jehovah's Witness.
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And so it's interesting, I downloaded the book, and I read some interesting stuff.
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It's page 20 in the PDF, it's page 22 of the book. I'm not sure how quite that works. Under the subtitle,
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A Challenge to Remain Silent, I'm reading now. With the recent upsurge of Calvinism, a number of leading
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Calvinists have begun to take a far more aggressive stance in its public promotion. Many on both sides, sadly, are increasingly making this issue a matter of fellowship in the
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Lord, resulting in division in a number of otherwise sound churches. In some churches, members are forbidden to promote
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Calvinism, even privately. In others, only Calvinists are accepted as members. I'll stop there for a moment and say, well,
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I guess that would include my own church, because we ask if you have substantial agreement with the
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London Baptist Confession of 1689. So I guess that would be a bad thing, but of course that's been going on for a long, long time.
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Anyway, of course, the latter has been true of pastors and mission candidates for nearly for centuries in nearly all
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Presbyterian churches, and even in some Baptist churches, duh. But now that position seems to be growing and hardening.
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Almost daily, I found that this subject was claiming a wider interest and greater importance than I had ever imagined. It seemed obvious that there was great need for further research and writing to deal with this important issue.
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As it became known that I intended to write such a book. Now when was that? That was right after the radio program that we did, which
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Dave Hunt makes available on his website. You can get the particular, not debate, discussion.
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I was hosting a radio program at the time, filling in for Marty Minto, the fellow who got canned back in Pittsburgh for his comments on the
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Pope. That's when he had his program here in Phoenix at KPXQ. Some claim that, out of ignorance of its true teachings,
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I had already misrepresented Reformed doctrine. A typical response from the Calvinist friends to whom
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I sent an early manuscript for comment went like this, quote, the caricatures you present and the straw men you construct demonstrate to me that you have absolutely no understanding of the
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Reformed position, and until you do, I would counsel that you refrain from putting anything in print, end quote. Now that sounded almost identical to what
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I wrote to him. And the reference on that is personal letter to Dave Hunt dated
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October 19th, 2000. And so I went back and looked at my correspondence, and I had one from July 20th of, no, no, no.
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Let me see. This is October 11th of 2000, and this was
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October 19th. So this might, I just didn't find this exact statement. Maybe I just skipped it here, but I wrote a letter to him in October of 2000, same month.
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And I was talking about wanting to get him to do another program, because we were still on KPXQ at that time.
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And I said to him, I'd very much like to review the book of which you speak. However, I feel it is my responsibility to be very open in telling you honestly that I do not believe you should publish on this topic.
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The reason is simple. Given the character of the article in your newsletter and your direct admission that you have not read any of the key works in this subject, either those produced in the
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Reformation, since then or even before then, Augustine's anti -Pelagian writings, for example, you are truly in no position to speak to the topic.
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It is simply not possible to give a meaningful rebuttal of a position that you do not understand. It would be like me seeking to write a book on advanced calculus.
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While I might, with sufficient study, be able to do so, I cannot even begin to do so given my current level of study of the subject.
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I've never even cracked a binding of an advanced calculus text, let alone delved into the subject in any depth. On the radio program we did together a few months ago,
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I started out by asking you how you explained your siding with Rome on the key soteriological battle of the Reformation, that being the conflict between Roman synergism and Reformed monergism.
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You began by admitting your ignorance of the Reformers and their writings. Might I suggest that there is no reason to critique a position without reading the original documents in which the position is espoused?
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Surely you cannot believe that the likes of Calvin, Bayes of the Crafters, the Westminster and London Confessions, John Owen, Francis Turridge and Jonathan Edwards, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Charles Hodge, William Cunningham, B .B.
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Warfield, J. Gresham Machen, John Murray and modern writers such as R .C. Sproul or John Gerstner have never heard of your objections before, can you?
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And since volumes exist responding to those very issues, how can you reiterate them without doing the requisite work that would give you the necessary standing to do so?
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Further, please be aware of the strength of the Reformed position is exegesis. It is not by accident that the
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Puritans, for example, thoroughgoing Calvinists as they were, emphasized so strongly a knowledge of the original languages of the
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Bible. Their ministers were required to be thoroughly capable of rightly handling the word of truth. It is the exegesis of the text of scripture that gives rise to the
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Reformed faith. Arminianism, on the other hand, is a philosophical position that arises from certain alleged philosophical necessities.
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It does not come from the exegesis of the text. This came out clearly in our discussion when faced with passages such as John 6, 37 -39, you immediately left the text and went elsewhere.
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Arminianism has no meaningful counter exegesis to offer to John 6 or Romans 8 or Ephesians 1.
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So I would strongly encourage you, Dave, to refrain from attempting to address a topic that you have already admitted is not an area of your study.
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I wrote God's Sovereign Grace and Drawn by the Father in 1990. I wrote the Potter's Freedom in 1998 -1999.
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I have dealt with this subject and your objections to it for many years now. At the very least, I have taken the time to study the issue sufficiently well to be able to address it fairly.
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I do not believe your recent article nor discussion on the radio show that you have done the work necessary for the writing of a book on that subject.
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Be that as it may, I would sure like to have you on our program again soon. And I invited him to come on, which of course he did not.
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I said I would invite you to a more focused and exegetical discussion. Let us discuss John 6, 37 through 44.
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Let's present in -depth discussions, the meaning of the text first, then discuss how we come to different conclusions. You have my presentation, the
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Potter's Freedom. You should have no problem pointing out the errors in my interpretation from the text itself. I simply do not find
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Arminians who can do this. I hope you will be the first. Let me know, and so on and so forth. I'm hearing something in my headphones.
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I'm hearing myself talking. I don't know what's going on here, but it sounds like a tape is being played or something, and it's coming through my headphones.
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I'm not sure why. Anyway, that's what I wrote to Dave Hunt in October of 2000, right around the same time.
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So if it wasn't me he's quoting, he certainly did get a very consistent response from everybody saying,
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Dave, you don't know what you're talking about. But Dave doesn't handle being told he doesn't know what he's talking about very well, and as a result he is simply unwilling to accept the reality that he might actually not know what he's referring to when he's talking about something.
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So he continues on. This is, again, this is now page 23 of the book.
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Letters began to pour into our ministry. The Berean call from around the world, many from pastors insisting that I was unqualified to address
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Calvinism and urging me to seal my lips and drop my pen regarding this subject, this topic. It was suggested that I would lose many friends and alienate myself from leading evangelicals, most of whom were said to be convinced
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Calvinists. Furthermore, who would publish such a book since the major publishers had brought out many books supporting the other side?
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That's a little bit of the Calvinist control everything conspiracy. What moved me most is a concern earnestly expressed by close friends that a book from me on this issue would cause division, the last thing
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I wanted. We can just hear it now, several friends told me. Here comes Dave Hunt again, this time he's attacking Calvinists.
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That concern weighed heavily upon me, obviously not heavily enough. Then he says this, this is interesting, one must be willing to accept wise counsel.
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Now, I guess that means that all these pastors who wrote to him and presented all sorts of things to him that he's never been able to provide a meaningful response to weren't giving him wise counsel.
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But the advice to remain silent, though given by so many out of genuine concern, seemed after much prayer and soul -searching on my part to be ill -advised.
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Then check this out, Spurgeon called the debate over God's sovereignty and man's free will a controversy which
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I believe to have been really healthy and which has done us all a vast amount of good, end quote. Yeah, but Dave, he came to the opposite conclusion that you did.
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My heart's desire is that this book will be only to God's eternal glory and the blessing of his people and of course he does again do the same thing
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I documented on the blog. He does the same thing with the Spurgeon quote, he quotes it again.
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He will not accept correction about what Spurgeon is talking about.
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He will not do so. Go ahead if you'd like to play that, that's fun. You can fire it up anytime.
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You can, just in case you need it. You lost it. I'm queuing it again.
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Hang on here, we'll try this. Fancy machines, you know. That's what I was hearing in my in my headphones.
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I didn't think you could, you weren't supposed to hear that. Oh, well actually no one's hearing it now. No kidding.
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I know exactly where it is though, so un momento por favor. I know
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I have the sound byte on my computer too, I just didn't, I just didn't actually, you know, queue it up.
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Oh, wait a minute, let me do something here. Okay, ready to go anytime you are. Yeah, really.
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Oh, there we go. Are you ready? I'm, you know, I've been ready for about a minute now. Well, first of all,
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James, I'm very ignorant of the Reformers. I have not had time to read them.
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There are truckloads, I guess, of their writings, and I like to just kind of pretend that we're back there in the days of the
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Apostles before all of these things were written, and I like to go to the Bible.
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So whether the Reformers said this or that, I don't know. I disagree with a lot of Martin Luther, for example, when
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I read his 95 Theses on indulgences, and when
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I read the Augsburg Confession, it sounds to me like they were still pretty much
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Catholics. So I'm not trying to align myself with the
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Reformers or with anybody else. I just go by what the
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Bible says. And there you go, and that became...
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That was, what, five years ago? Next month? August of 2000. Yeah, yeah.
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And I'm looking here on my system under my hunt sounds.
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I've got all sorts of things here, but I wonder if it's that one. I've got all sorts of them, including the one where he says that he...
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About six months... It was actually January, so that would only be five months later. I have the one where he's saying that he knew more about Calvinism than most
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Calvinists do, and all the rest of that stuff. So, you know, we've documented this stuff for quite some time, and, you know, this is nothing new.
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People can go back through our archives and listen to a lot of this.
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But anyways, here comes a new book, and it is in the form of a dialogue.
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There really isn't anything new in it. As you read through it, you can see that he is seeking to, a couple times, respond to some of the criticisms that have come his direction, just without necessarily being very open about it.
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And, you know, the problem is... I have a number of problems with Dave Hunt anymore, but the main problem is real simple.
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It's an honesty issue. It's simple honesty. He has made mistakes.
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He simply will not admit them, and he will not come out in the open and debate this issue.
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Dave Hunt would lose a debate. It would be absolutely so illustrative of the complete incapacity of his position to answer direct questions for him to have to debate this subject.
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That's why he will not do it. He just refuses to do it. And the excuses that he continues to present are just that.
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They are excuses. They are not answers. I stand ready.
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He's still cranking out the materials against Calvinism. No one knows Dave Hunt's position on Calvinism better than I do.
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I'm the one who co -authored the book with him. I'm the one who, when we promoted the book with Multnomah and we do radio programs, they'd have to book us for two different days because Dave wouldn't come on with me.
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Those of you who heard the one time where he messed up and came on with me, didn't know I was going to be there until the program was already started, could tell how upset he was by that.
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And that was the one hosted by the guy who was more Arminian than Dave. Remember that one?
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It's so obvious to anybody that there's one side here that does the biblical exegesis, there's one side here that is willing to do dialogue and debate, and there's one side that claims to do biblical exegesis but won't touch the issues of the ten -foot pole when you'd actually be forced to get into text and actually deal with it on a fair basis.
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Is there anything new about this? No. I'm afraid not.
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This is what we're seeing from all these folks and it seems that the people, especially like in the Southern Baptist Convention...
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Oh, by the way, I keep forgetting to do this. Someone reminded me when the program's over, I need to blog. The fact that Tom Askle now has a blog.
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He has joined the blogosphere and I need to blog the Tom Askle blog. But people like the Founders Conference, Tom Askle, they know that there are people within the
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Southern Baptist Convention who really want to get rid of those folks. Remember we played some clips a few weeks ago from the
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Southern Baptists? We played Johnny Hunt and we played Jerry Falwell.
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These folks are really not open to discussion about this. You know what? They are not open to it.
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I just saw there's a book called The Potter's Freedom to Love the World. Never heard of it. It's supposed to be a refutation of my book.
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Who's that by? Is that more of the same guy? Is that the Lavender book or something?
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If so, then yes, we have pointed out some of the interesting issues concerning Dr.
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Lavender and his interesting use of the Greek language. Anyway, so these folks want to come after Calvinism with fork and tong, but they first want to cut your tongue out to make sure you can't say anything.
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What must it be like to have a theology that you know you can never defend against someone who holds the opposite of that?
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What is that like? I cannot even begin to understand that. It truly just leaves me utterly...
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Yes, that's Lavender. To the person on the channel wondering about that, don't think the book's out.
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Doubt it ever will come out. If it is, see the blog. I pointed out some of the issues regarding Dr.
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Lavender on the blog a little while ago. So anyway, that's what's going on there. My first thought immediately, as soon as I saw this book in the form it was in, is
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I can write like this. And what I mean by that is I can... This is in a dialogue format.
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I like writing dialogue -type books. You saw in Sola Scriptura, that's a very useful form.
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And if I didn't have stuff, you know, staring me in the face right now that I've got to get done, especially in regards to the debate coming up, it would not take long to produce a book of equal length or even longer in dialogue format that just lays this entire hunt argument open.
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And who knows, maybe after the debate's over, we could set aside a few days. And honestly, if I just wasn't interrupted, if I let other people blog for a few days and didn't have too much else going on, it would only take, quite honestly, a couple days to write something like that.
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It really, really honestly would. And it would be nice to have it available. And who knows, maybe that's something we'll do.
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It's already been suggested by some others that that would be a possibility that we could do something like that. So we'll see what happens.
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So anyway, 877 -753 -3341 is the phone number to call the program today.
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Speaking of those who continue to speak out against that which they do not understand, we have for quite some time been addressing...
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oh, oh, that's... well, all right, I guess before we do that, we have a phone caller down in Houston, Texas.
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Hello. How are you, Aaron? I'm doing great. What's up? I was listening to your discussion on NT Wright.
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I don't remember where I got this, but you had mentioned, apparently, they had spoken about or they had sung the hymn,
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Can It Be, by Charles Wesley. And you had said that the third verse in it originally was different.
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And I looked everywhere to find out what the original version of it was. Do you know what I'm talking about? No, I know that in...
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I don't... Maybe it wasn't that hymn. I could have sworn it was. I don't recall anything about NT Wright and And Can It Be, but I know that And Can It Be, in the original version, is rather heretical.
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And we sing a fixed version of that because, as I recall, it says something along the lines of, emptied himself of all but love, and I believe in...
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Let's see if... I think I might have it in here. Let me see if this is where we got it from or not.
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I'm not sure. I've got the modern Trinity hymnal here, and I know it's not in the older one that we had.
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We had to actually paste a copy of it in. There it is. 455.
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And let me see if this is the changed verse. Yeah, here.
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The original was something about emptied himself of all but love and bled for all of Adam's race, or something along those lines.
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The Trinity hymnal's current version here says, humbled himself so great his love and bled for all his chosen race, to his mercy all, and so on and so forth.
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So, I don't... I have no idea what you're referring to. I don't remember the... Well, I know that's what you were talking about.
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I don't know where you were or what you were talking about. Yeah, I'm sorry. It could have been any time over the past decade in 500 different places.
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Okay, well, thanks for that because I had been looking for the Yeah, it's in the current Trinity hymnal, and I think...
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I could be wrong about this, but there's a white, soft -bound type of hymnal supplement that I've seen in some
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Reformed churches, and I think the version of it in there is the same as the Trinity, as I recall.
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I think, but I could be wrong about that. But that's what I... wherever I was, whatever I was talking about, that's probably what
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I was was referring to, is I probably had sung it differently than everybody else did.
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Someone on the channel is saying that I mentioned it when I spoke in Austin. I don't recall what I spoke about in Austin.
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Well, actually, I would have. Now that I think about it, Austin is where I talked about the New Perspectives.
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That's probably where it was. It's probably an MP3 you got off of the web, and it was probably down there in Austin when
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I was addressing New Perspectivism, or something along those lines, and maybe we had just sung it before I spoke or something.
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That's got to be what it was. Must be. On that note, I read Guy Prentice Waters' book,
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Justification in the New Perspectives, I recall. Do you have any other reading material that you would recommend for that?
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Well, I look up at the entire shelf of stuff on that, and there's a tremendous amount of material that has been coming out.
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It all depends on what level of information you want to get into.
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I think we're going to be seeing some further publication of books like Kim's and others that are on a fairly high level.
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I'm not sure about materials that are going to be more accessible without everybody having to read
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Sanders and so on and so forth, but that's certainly the one that I'm going to be speaking on the subject up in St.
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Louis, and that's what we're suggesting people read is the Waters book right now. Just to give them a...
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because it gives you... there aren't too many books out. Almost any other book is going to be focused on just one area, and it's about the only thing that does what it does, really, at that point, as far as providing the breadth of discussion there.
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Okay. All right. Dr. White. Thanks a lot. We're going to take our break and then come back with Adam in Ohio with a comment on Dave Hunt, and then, depending on the phone calls, pick up with the
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Adrian Rogers discussion of hyper -Calvinism, but we're going to take our break first.
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Be right back. 877 -753 -3341. What is
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Dr. Norman Geisler warning the Christian community about in his book Chosen but Free, A New Cult, Secularism, False Prophecy Scenarios?
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No, Dr. Geisler is sounding the alarm about a system of beliefs commonly called Calvinism. He insists that this belief system is theologically inconsistent, philosophically insufficient, and morally repugnant.
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In his book, The Potter's Freedom, James White replies to Dr. Geisler, but The Potter's Freedom is much more than just a reply.
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It is a defense of the very principles upon which the Protestant Reformation was founded. Indeed, it is a defense of the very gospel itself.
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In a style that both scholars and laymen alike can appreciate, James White masterfully counters the evidence against so -called extreme
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Calvinism, defines what the Reformed faith actually is, and concludes that the gospel preached by the
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Reformers is the very one taught in the pages of Scripture. The Potter's Freedom, a defense of the
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Reformation and a rebuttal to Norman Geisler's Chosen but Free. You'll find it in the Reformed theology section of our bookstore at AOMN .org.
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Is the Bible true? Never before in history has the authority and inspiration of the
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Holy Scriptures been so viciously attacked by those outside the pale of orthodoxy and within the walls of traditional evangelicalism itself.
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Join us August 27th, 2005 at the Sea -Tac Marriott for an historic debate between evangelical
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Christian apologist Dr. James R. White and world -renowned Jesus Seminar co -founder and Bible skeptic
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Dr. John Dominic Crossan as they debate a topic which every Christian should be concerned about.
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I'm just glad we got back. Hopefully our theological insights today are a little bit better than our technical capacities.
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I don't know what's going on but I expect to start hearing John Lennon in my headphones or something.
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I need to get a sound by you know with one of the little tricycles with wobbly wheels. Okay I was wondering how long heat exhaustion lasted
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I thought that's only a 24 -hour thing. Oh hey be nice he died yesterday.
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Goodbye to Dr. Doohan there. But anyways we do need to go to our callers.
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Anyone brave enough to call in this program needs to be put on the air. So let's talk to Adam.
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Hi Adam. Hey James how are you doing? I'm doing okay. I wanted to tell you I was listening to your discussion of Dave Hunt and I guess
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I can speak. I'm a Presbyterian so I guess I can speak from a non -biased perspective.
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No I think he would include you in the biased group. Well anyways I was just noticing the same thing.
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My grandmother is a member of the Church of the Nazarene and they're they're about as Reformed as the
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Presbyterians are Reformed. Okay. I mean and she listens to all these guys the same stuff in fact the
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Muslim guy that she mentioned she always just praises him and the thing is James you're right you cannot get these guys to discuss it.
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No. I mean I mean and the bad thing is they don't really they don't have a reason to. I mean they have so much to lose by it.
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I mean think about it they have you just plop a couple of names like Tim LaHaye and you know
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Dave Hunt on the back of the book and it'll keep people from listening to the other side. Yeah you know what
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I should suggest Tim LaHaye to the folks back there trying to set up that debate now that would be really fun.
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Let me tell you something it's just amazing I mean it's it's just basically when
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I when I listen to for instance Jerry Falwell she gets his program his television station at her house and I listen to him and I mean it's just bang bang bang bang bang shoot
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Calvinism down don't even bother to give anything else I mean sometimes it's just so bad that I'm just sitting here thinking why would this man step up there if he had if he knows that there's objections to that and I think oh that's right he doesn't have to because he's such a famous man everyone's just going to believe what he says.
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Unfortunately. Yeah they're very even the few that would attempt to get them to dialogue regarding that particular issue are shot down so quickly and and they're they're just not a position of being held accountable for the comments they make and so yeah they they get away with everything and so I know
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I all I can do is is throw my hands up in the air and and try and put the put the stuff out there.
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You're absolutely right James they want Calvinism to be considered complete heresy. Yeah they want to be thrown completely out and it really makes me wonder when you consider that it almost seems like their view when
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I from what I'm looking at it if it's consistent it reduces to Pelagianism. Well if they're consistent that's the problem they will you know the idea of consistency is not exactly central to their to their thinking unfortunately and and they're not pushed to be consistent on those things that's you're getting too deep you're you're causing divisions when you when you press for consistency so yeah
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I'm praying for you and I hope that you do get a chance to debate some of these folks.
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It would be nice. It would be great. You know I've said from the beginning I think a DVD of a debate between myself and and Dave Hunt to go along with the book debating
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Calvinism would be absolutely wonderfully useful and I can't imagine what excuses he can give to say that no it would not be useful.
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You could do you could do a four -party even your first radio program the book then the program you did with the
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Armenian guy and then your video debate. That would be great. I'd love to but you know he just feels like he's said everything he needs to say though he'll continue writing books continue doing other debates and videos and things like that and so well anyway.
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Alrighty thanks for your call. Yes indeed well certainly someone does does know that he has a standing challenge and you know
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I guess about the only thing I can I can think of that's they can sort of console me in that situation is that when he stands in front of an audience he must be thinking as he does so you know is there somebody out there that's gonna that's gonna challenge me along those same lines
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I know that I don't have an answer I'm gonna have to bluster I'm gonna have to change a topic you know I don't know maybe it's maybe it's possible.
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Anyhow going back once again we started quite some time ago playing a yeah what about the audience of one well anyway we began playing a presentation that Dr.
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Adrian Rogers a well -known Southern Baptist leader made to a college Bible study on the subject of what he calls hyper
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Calvinism and of course hyper Calvinism to him is just five -point
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Calvinism so he does not make the proper distinctions between between the two they're quite different systems but we've been listening to that and we're about halfway through it first is very difficult to hear but it's it's cleaned up now so we're 23 minutes in on a 30 seven minutes so we were actually more than halfway through the presentations let's try to knock off a few more minutes here as some men count slackness but as long suffering to us we're not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance it's not
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God's will that any man go to hell God's will is not always done did you get the idea because God is sovereign that God's will is always done you think race is
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God's will you think sodomy is God's will you think blasphemy is God's will no
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God gave man a will God himself is not willing that any repair now you just heard a glowing example not only of using a passage out of context we have dealt with the big three
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Matthew 23 37 first of the two foreign secretary 39 so many times in the past that you could find multiple references there too in the archives on the blog and so on so forth but not only is it ignoring the context and assuming a particular meaning without showing any evidence of even being aware of the other possibilities and and arguing from your own for your own perspective at least when
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I preach that passage to do that passage I do so but more than that you just heard a glowing example of theological equivocation theological equivocation do you think
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God's will is always done okay well if by that you mean a perfect will expressed in law for man that is if you're asking do you think men always do what
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God's law would say they should do well of course not of course not but did you notice what he said he said do you think rape is
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God's will I think about the Old Testament a few times I think about the
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Old Testament a few times think about a few incidents in the Old Testament how's that there was rape in the
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Old Testament no question about it there was rape within godly families remember
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David's situation and God used every single one of those situations
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God used prostitutes there are there are prostitutes listed in the genealogy of Christ was genealogy of Christ and he was haphazard something was not a part of God's decree and Isaiah chapter 10
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God brings a godless nation a pagan nation against a godless nation that is
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Israel to do all sorts of things which included by the way rape and murder and the killing of children and all sorts of terrible horrible things and is is dr.
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Rogers saying that these things took place outside of God's will and they become purposeless random unknown to God how did
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God know they're going to happen when God created you know they're going to happen and yet he still created in that way which would bring that about if you remember our discussions of these issues these become the questions that you just can't get these folks to actually address and the few that do address end up becoming open theists functionally in their in their activities so you hit you you hear a
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Bible passage I suggested not exegete but I suggest thrown out there and on the basis of an is a jetticle presentation of that passage you then have this assertion that you think
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God's will is always done well what will you talking about are you talking about that which is revealed in his law no you're talking about that which is a part of which defines his eternal decree yes well we don't we don't want to talk about that that you're getting far too complicated there well how can you not address these issues when you're talking to talking to young people about important things but God gave man a will and hope and God gave man a will as if that has something to do with Calvinism notice the assumption and this the assumed ideas smuggled into words without actually giving a basis of course man has a will but is his will libertarian is it free or is he a slave of sin that that obviously again would have to be the question if you're going to seriously address the subject in a meaningful fashion some do perish but the love of God will follow that man to that hill with tears if he goes now here's here's the way now well wait a minute that now let's let's picture this one the love of God undifferentiated evidently the salvific love of God the love of God that that nailed the
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Sun to a cross the love of God that made Christ the substitute for this person the love of God that engineered this plan of salvation whereby a perfect atonement has been offered propitiations taking place wrath has been removed for this person's sins but because he's almighty and he has all power the man that is he goes to hell and the love of God follows him to the very pits of hell itself and so we've got a
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God who has this undifferentiated love who is going to be unhappy for eternity yes he's going to love the elect who surround the throne but it'd be like if you had ten children and you loved all of them equally and five of them died or five of them even worse were in a place of punishment and you you're you're going to be unhappy and unfulfilled the entire rest of your well all eternity all eternity
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God will be frustrated those upon whom he has said his salvific love for whom the the the the
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Sun died in the spirit came to apply those benefits they all failed and God's gonna be unhappy for eternity that's that's what's being presented
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I don't believe that I don't believe God's gonna be unhappy for eternity I believe that in the ultimate analysis of all things
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God's decree will be fulfilled he is going to glorify himself in the creation of a specific people in Christ Jesus and he is going to be pleased fulfilled in his self glorification no question about it no question about I don't
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I do not believe in what Adrian Rogers is saying right now and I have to wonder truly have to wonder if he even sees the ultimate conclusion to his own assertion here's the way the the hypercalvinist explains it here's a farmer that farmer has a swimming hole on his farm he puts up a sign that says no swimming under any circumstances private now where have we heard this folks wherever you heard this story before this is the story that Norman Geisler tells in chosen but free that I spent quite a deal quite amount of time dealing with in the potter's freedom property stay out three boys come in there and they begin to swim they get out in the middle and they're drowning he drives by on his tractor he looks over there and those three boys over there today deserve to drown if he obligated to say no did he put up the sign is he is he unjust if he let them drown
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I'm talking about hypercalvinism no no he's not unjust they he said don't remember you again for those who you know not aware of the situation here hypercalvinism to Adrian Rogers is just simply
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Calvinism nothing more than that do it they did it they chose could he be blamed if they if they drown no so he can just if he wants to he can be perfectly just and just ride right on my instructor which of course is not the illustration whatsoever that I provide a counter -illustration in in the potter's freedom the demonstrates the numerous misrepresentations and canards in the boys swimming in the swimming hole you have these boys and they're just innocent
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I mean come on they're not rebel sinners they're not worthy of death these are not three convicted murderers who how about that guy that murder the family took two kids killed one of the two kids was caught with the one girl sexually assaulted all of them let's make let's let's make it those guys and then we can start actually talking about you know making some sense out of this illustration but and you know that works that's quick take a call here relevant to something we just said about the second
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Peter 3 -9 let's talk with Jim hi Jim how are you hi are you doing good good
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I say I just wondered you debated dr. Wilkin recently and one of his recent publications he wrote on that that text of scripture on what it meant to perish he takes it back to verse 6 basically he is saying that perishing there's physical death and God doesn't want people to die if I understand incorrectly what doesn't want people to die premature really still there
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Jim I've lost Jim is that over on the other side there hello hello
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I don't hear Jim did you just do something and there it goes sorry
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Jim real quickly I'll just comment on that okay through which the world at that time was destroyed being flooded with water and so he's drawing that back not wishing for a to perish for all to come repentance being people dying prematurely well that is one of the problems with the anti -lordship folks is that there is no any passage that refers to perishing that you don't want to refer to perishing you just make it physical death instead of spiritual death and obviously he's talking about the perishing that comes as a result of not repenting so I have absolutely positively no idea how he establishes that I did not see it sorry
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Jim that we we lost you there I didn't touch anything it maybe it was a cell phone or you are in southern
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Arizona and southern Arizona is still maybe you have a thunderstorm down there maybe we could we could certainly use it but I appreciate the call let's continue with dr.
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Rogers here but suppose he says oh I'm gonna have mercy on the boy in the trunk so he throws him a line after all he doesn't have to have mercy on any of them so he just decides well
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I'm going to choose that one and he just chooses that one and says the other two you can drown you deserve to drown
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I choose that one and he throws that one a line because he is the elect and he's the one that is saying somebody says see that that's consistent with the nature of God God still perfectly just if he does that that's not consistent with the nature of God because not only it's
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God just God is love and yeah God God is
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God is love but the problem is of course the entire analogy is grossly flawed you don't have here rebel sinners who love their sin you do not have a farmer who is a holy
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God I use the illustration of a sovereign king coming to his castle that has been taken over by rebels who have murdered and raped his people and they are inside the castle and they are burning the castle down and the son of the king goes into the castle and he he saves some of these rebel sinners that are undeserving they are deserving of the worst punishment in the world and yet despite that despite the fact that they they fight against the
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Sun as he tries to save them yet he saves them anyhow that was the illustration that I tried to provide which is much more consistent with the biblical representation of the sinfulness of man man's slavery to sin the valley of the the dry bones the the hardened stony heart over against the fleshly heart why won't these people who on all sorts of other subjects will use the entirety
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Bible why won't they give proper illustrations here it's because of tradition it's because of tradition taking the place of exegesis because of tradition and a fear of what it means to have their own current theology examined in the light of Scripture to see that in point of fact their current theology is not consistent their current practice of of evangelism that turns
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God into a beggar rather than the sovereign king is not biblical and they're unwilling to have that examined there and willing to have that examined in the light of Scripture God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten
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Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish notice dr.
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Rogers aside from how wonderfully you say the word world that in point of fact
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John 316 has a delimiter in it doesn't it has a a limitation and if you were going to be consistent in utilization is passage you'd you would now be explaining how the two fit together but don't expect that you think that God God of love would not choose to save all three which logically results in what universalism there you go although now suppose the farmer throws a line to all three boys and if we're gonna have a biblical anthropology now what are the three boys going to do when he throws a line they are going to reject it consistently because they hate
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God if we're gonna have a biblical anthropology but we're not gonna have a biblical anthropology here are we you can't have a biblical anthropology and be an
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Arminian so until I'm saying oh thank you I think I can make it to show they said no take the line if you know
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I'm gonna do it myself and they perish but he does that mean that his that his love was not real or ineffectual not at all now ineffectual does seem to be an option there doesn't it didn't accomplish what it intended to do did it just saying by no means doesn't doesn't answer the question does it even under that system it would still be that his love is not only unfulfilled ineffectual it's going to be unfulfilled he's going to be unhappy because they don't just perish and disappear they perish and and go to hell and so they're gonna be in hell and his love still gonna be set upon them for all of eternity unfulfilled and unhappy is that really the position that that is being presented seems to be and do
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I think that dr. Rogers needs to consider the ramifications of the position yes do
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I think there's something wrong when people can be put in a position of being in leadership and they're not challenged to do that on a regular basis yes is that endemic to most of of evangelicalism today yes because most people stopped thinking about their theology and growing in their theology and examining their theology and they got a seminary if they even did it much in seminary to be honest with you anymore in seminary you're considered to be a mean nasty terrible horrible person if you step on anybody's toes and make them think so anyway all right it's uh let's see today was today was
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Thursday so we'll see you Lord willing next Tuesday morning 11 o 'clock my time 2 o 'clock in the
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Eastern Daylight Time we'll see you then God bless we need been brought to you by Alpha and Omega Ministries if you'd like to contact us call us at 602 -973 -4602 or write us at P .O.
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Box 37106 Phoenix Arizona 85069 you can also find us on the worldwide web at AOMIN .org
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that's A -O -M -I -N dot O -R -G where you'll find a complete listing of James White's books, tapes, debates, and tracks.